John U. Bacon - A true prophet

In Blue Ice, Bacon talks about how Michigan Hockey always wins its championships as the underdog, but fails to perform when they are the favorite. Taking the limited view of the past two seasons -- the man is a prophet.

I don't think there's been a Michigan team I've ever followed in the 17-ish seasons I've followed Michigan hockey that's been as big of an underdog as this one. Let's not get ahead of ourselves, there's still a LOT of work to be done.

Not really. 1998 was the year out of those three teams where there really was an underdog situation. 1996 was a strong team expected to compete after coming VERY close in the 1995 Frozen Four. 1997 was probably the best team Red ever had, IMO. 1998, expectations were low in comparison, yet it was still a very, very talented squad.

I know there's going to be comparisons to 1998, and I was making them earlier when I was thinking about it, but really... This is an entirely different universe.

We were underdogs against BU in the semifinals. I'm pretty sure they were consensus #1 and had been for most of the season, but we spanked them 4-0. In the finals, I think it was pretty close, we might have been slight favorites.

...at Yost or elsewhere that hasn't found some time to read Blue Ice should march down to WTKA or campus or wherever they can find Bacs and a) turn in their sweater, b) apologize, and c) get a copy and read it.

Unfortunately, in an NCAA regional, you usually don't have much of a neutral crowd to bank on. In this regional, Miami and Michigan are going to be the only substantial fanbases. Miami fans are not going to cheer for Michigan. I'd also be very, very surprised if this one sells out, so it's going to be a sparse arena on top of things.

That being said, you're right, you can have a neutral-site crowd turn a game around if the conditions are right. Holy Cross' upset of #1 Minnesota in 2006 was in large part propelled by an arena full of North Dakota fans loudly cheering against the Gophers. This, though, isn't one of those situations.